Tour LB’s Community Gardens and Farms by Bike

Explore some of Long Beach’s best kept secret urban gardens in the north, central and downtown neighborhoods.

Empact, a grassroots bicycle advocacy group sponsored by the California Endowment, is organizing a slow paced bicycle tour of community gardens and farms in Long Beach.

“We are creating thematic bike tours of the city,” said Danny Gamboa, “to engage and encourage and support underserved communities in the creation of bike advocates, events, group bike rides and more.”
On Sunday July 20, Gamboa invites the community to start the tour at 9am with an exploration of award-winning Long Beach artist Trace Fukuhara’s Pacific Wind Arts Sculpture Garden at the corner of 21st Street and Martin Luther King.

A former drive-thru marker, Trace turned his parents store into a fantasyland and home for his oversized, hyper-colored works like a metal staircase with wings entitled “Stairway to Heaven.”

After which, riders will ease their way to North Long Beach to sneak a peek at the largest farm space in Long Beach, The Growing Experience located at the Carmelitos Housing Project at 750 Via Carmelitos.

David Hedden of Leaf & Fin, a project that uses fish waste to grow plants, and plant waste to grow fish, will be showing his exciting aquaponics system.

Finally, riders will head from the top of the town to the downtown area to explore Foodscape Long Beach’s Chestnut Lot which is a permaculture garden, or a garden intended to be sustainable and self-sufficient. In Foodscape Long Beach’s words: “We build and maintain sustainable food production systems on underused land, teach agricultural literacy, and facilitate access to food and other resources.”

This community ride is brought to you by Empact Long Beach. The ride is free and open to everyone. For more information visit empactlb.com.